Jay Hunt, AppleTV+ European creative director, praised the US streamer for “investing literally millions and millions of pounds in British creativity” in first public speech as chair of the British Film Institute (BFI).
“When you have American investment in this country, people get anxious about what that’s going to look like,” she said, during an industry talk at the BFI London FIlm Festival.
She pointed towards AppleTV+ series including See-Saw’s Slow Horses, which the BBC turned down, and London-set thriller Criminal Record as “achingly British in terms of their tonality, and they have without exception travelled with audiences around the world.
“That’s something I can be incredibly proud of – and as someone who has built their career and actively chosen to stay in this market, working somewhere we’ve given visual effects designers the challenge of saying – can you bring alive the world of 66 million years ago [in Prehistoric Planet]? Or to an extraordinary production designer, on Slow Horses, I want you to build [Slow Horses setting] Slough House with an attention to detail which is frankly jaw dropping, to be able to do that, and you can do that in this market – it’s not a brain drain, you don ‘t have to go somewhere else to do that, that’s something I’m really proud of.”
Hunt is the first woman in over 20 years to hold the post of BFI chair. The last was Joan Bakewell. Hunt took over the position from Vue chief executive Tim Richards in February. Prior to AppleTV+, she led the creative output of BBC One, Channel 4 and Channel 5.
“The truth is, public services is a defining part of who I am. It matters massively to me. I genuinely think great film and TV can change the world. So being back connected with an organisation with a public service remit is such an important thing.
“The other reason I was attracted to it, I don’t think it’s any exaggeration to say, is that the BFI is the R&D [research and development] lab for creative skills and the screen success I this country. It is the engine room of what we do for film and TV.”
The talk, hosted by TV presenter Claudia Winkleman, did not include an opportunity for an audience Q&A.
Hunt reflected on her break in to the industry, in which she rang the deputy editor on BBC Breakfast News every day for three weeks to get her first job. She described herself as always feeling drawn to being a “disrupter” in her career, and rose through the ranks in TV as a “conspicuous woman” at a time in which there weren’t many women in visible roles in the industry.
“I only mentor women now,” she explained, with concerns about women leaving the screen sectors in their late 30s and early 40s, “who may be parents, they may have caring responsibilities, they may have relationships, and they want to be able to do all of that and do it really well, but they also want to say – yes, I’ll go to Penang for six months for a feature shoot, or yes, I’ll be undercover in prison for three months”.
Hunt is concerned there is still a drain of women from the screen industries in this phase of life.
“I don’t think we’ve solved that. I don’t think we’ve found working practices that make it possible. It’s not just women, it’s true for men as well who have those responsibilities,” said Hunt.
She also spoke about the issue of women still “undervaluing their skill sets” and repeated some advice passed onto her by businesswoman and chair of Time’s Up UK Heather Rabbatts: “If you’re in a meeting, make sure you are in line of sight of the decision maker. If you’re sitting at a long table, how often do you see that women come into the room, sit at the end of the table, be quiet and not want to interrupt?”
Hunt admitted she had not lived her own advice when it came to joining the BFI board of governors, as she did in 2020. “I talk a good game, but I would never have applied to be on the board of governors of the BFI. I thought – oh my goodness, that sounds like a scary old thing. I was approached and chased to do it. And so my point being, if you find it difficult to put yourself forward, do as I say, not as I do.”
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